Additional repairs needed to the Exeter Town Hall

EXETER — While the Exeter Town Hall reopened this week, not all the repair work is complete.

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By Jeff McMenemy

seacoastonline.com

By Jeff McMenemy

Posted Oct. 4, 2013 at 2:00 AM

By Jeff McMenemy
Posted Oct. 4, 2013 at 2:00 AM

» Social News

EXETER — While the Exeter Town Hall reopened this week, not all the repair work is complete.

Town Manager Russ Dean said the building will remain open for the immediate future and will still host an event next week, but at some point in the future workers will have to replace the floor in the auditorium.

"We discovered some additional buckling in the auditorium due to water damage and that's going to have to be replaced," Dean said.

When representatives of the town's insurance company initially looked at the Town Hall after an April fire caused minimal fire damage but led to water damage through the historic building, they didn't think there was enough damage in the auditorium floor that it needed to be replaced, Dean said.

"As time went by we realized there was more significant buckling of the floor and we've gone back and looked at it again," Dean said.

He does not yet know when the work will be done or how much it will cost — the town's insurance company paid for all the repairs that were just completed.

"Probably for just a few weeks," he said.

Dean said officials will work around the floor in the main auditorium when it is constructed, and events will not be held on the main floor during that time. However the building itself will remain open, according to Dean.

They'll also move the town employees who work in the Finance Department that's located in the basement because of the noise that will be going on above them.

For now though, Dean said, the building is open and ready to host events.

"Actually we're in good shape," Dean said. "I toured it a couple of days ago and the carpeting was just put down in the art gallery and it's drying. But the place looks very good."

Town officials were excited earlier this week when they thought all the repairs to the building were complete.

Board of Selectmen Chairman Don Clement said the board approved several events for the Town Hall at Monday's selectmen's meeting.

"I think it's great it's open again because of all the different events we had to cancel or were in jeopardy," Clement said Tuesday night.

Clement, who has been critical in the past about how long it took before crews started the repairs, which were paid for by the town's insurance provider, said the announcement that the work was completed lifted what he called "a sense of apprehension."

"Especially around Christmas time, there's a lot of events," Clement said. "We use Town Hall for the festival of trees and all the other holiday events."

Selectman Frank Ferraro noted Tuesday the Town Republican Committee has reserved the Town Hall for an event on Oct. 12 to commemorate the 160th anniversary of the birth of the Republican Party, which was started in Exeter.

"This is a significant event and another one of those historical events in Exeter," Ferraro said.

He said the number of applications selectmen are already receiving to use the Town Hall indicates just how popular the building is.

Dean has previously said the contractors had 90 days to complete the repairs on the Town Hall. The work started on July 16, so the workers actually finished the repairs early.

The town's insurance company approved the roughly $269,000 in work that needed to be done on the Town Hall.

Repair work included installing new flooring in the art gallery, fixing or replacing tin ceiling tiles in the main auditorium, and repainting and doing some plaster work throughout the Town Hall.